


this is the house of decay, where you ruin if you stay

by tigerlo



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: AND ALSO SEX, F/F, Feelings, Fex?, Pre-official relationship declaration, Shall I make that a thing that I can apply to almost everything I write?, This is all about feelings, feelings and sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-25
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-06-16 00:27:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15424992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tigerlo/pseuds/tigerlo
Summary: It’s not so simple as it was, this thing between she and Charity.It’s not so clean.It’s notjustsex anymore. Although, Vanessa wonders if it ever was.





	this is the house of decay, where you ruin if you stay

**Author's Note:**

> This is pre-official relationship 'girlfriend' chat, and probably quite early on in their physical relationship, I think? Or I imagine anyway, but it can really be wherever you'd like it to be. 
> 
> I wanted to explore Charity still being a bit prickly and defensive and Vanessa starting to usher down those barriers (not _break_ them because they're not animals and I don't think you should break anything anyone builds around them) and this is the result.

-

 

 

It’s not so simple as it was, this thing between she and Charity. 

 

It’s not so clean. 

 

It’s not  _ just _ sex anymore. Although, Vanessa wonders if it ever was. 

 

She’s done the casual thing, more often than she would care to admit at this later stage in her life, she’s been the person sneaking out of some blokes room in the middle of the night, she’s done it all, so much so that she knows the difference between totally uncomplicated sex and slightly  _ more _ complicated sex, and this is definitely the latter. 

 

It’s always felt  _ complex _ with Charity. It’s complex because it’s simple but there are things, details that weave themselves around the two of them that make it so. Simple and so very difficult all at the same time. 

 

It’s simple, because Vanessa has never wanted someone, has never  _ something _ more than she wants Charity. Never. 

 

It’s difficult because Charity herself is….complicated. 

 

Charity is complicated, not because of her past, or her present, but because she seems so determined to play it cool, to the detriment of Vanessa’s feelings, and if Vanessa’s not wholly mistaken, her own, too. She plays it so cool that Vanessa’s not sure, for days on end whether they’re on or off, hot or cold, until Charity gives her a salacious wink from behind the bar, or grabs Vanessa’s arse with an artful subtlety in passing that could be mistaken for a slip of the hand, if not for the caught breath Vanessa hears snag in Charity’s throat when Vanessa’s head whips around to catch the movement. 

 

She’s a master at this whole ice queen routine, Charity Dingle is, better than anyone Vanessa’s ever met before, only she can see cracks in it now. It had taken her a while to learn Charity’s nuances, to learn her tells - when she’s happy even though she’s frowning, and that she’s hurt even when Vanessa can see the smile clear on her lips - but she can now. 

 

It’s almost cute, really, that Charity thinks she’s clever enough to hide all of this neatly from Vanessa at this stage in their - she won’t call it a relationship because Charity’s made it abundantly clear that it’s  _ not _ \- although she thinks Charity’s beginning to cotton on, or she’s trying less hard to hide things now than she did when they first fell into bed together. 

 

Sometimes she does away with the pretence completely, sometimes she doesn’t even bother with the honey-drizzled words. Sometimes she’s too tired. Sometimes they both are. 

 

Like now. 

 

“Suppose you’ll be off, then?” Charity says, turning onto her side as Vanessa’s heart slows from its heavy gallop, not bothering to look back over to Vanessa when she speaks. 

 

She pulls the sheet up underneath her arm, obscuring bare skin from Vanessa’s view, and there’s something about the movement that makes Vanessa frown. 

 

She knows how this dance normally goes. 

 

She comes at Charity’s beck and call, or sometimes Charity does to hers, and then they come  _ together _ , and then someone leaves with a racing pulse and a few more battle scars to bear until the bruises fade, or until they can be added to. 

 

Normally she just leaves when Charity turns her back and signals she’s done with Vanessa’s company, but there’s something in the complexity of the way her muscles bunch in her back, and the way she had kissed Vanessa, harder than usual when she had appeared at the back door of the pub after responding to Charity’s message, that tell Vanessa that there’s something else going on tonight. 

 

Because she  _ does _ know Charity. She knows that Charity clenches her jaw before Vanessa kisses her when she’s angry. She knows that Charity cracks her knuckles when she’s anxious. She knows that Charity’s quieter when she’s upset, but she’s rougher too, like she’s trying to claw back control of some long lost thing that someone else has robbed her of. 

 

“Do you want me to go?” Vanessa asks, and she risks running her fingertips along the line of Charity’s shoulder blade when she speaks.

 

It’s easy to be affectionate towards Charity,  _ too _ easy, easier than it should be with someone she’s  _ not _ in a relationship with. It comes to her as softly as breathing, and with anyone else she’d just express whatever it was pushing against the inside of her skin wanting out, but it’s not as simple as that with Charity, because she knows that too much affection will drive her away. She knows that too much intimacy will make Charity recoil inwards. 

 

“Don’t you want to?” Charity says, still not turning around, although Vanessa feels the way Charity pushes into her touch  _ just _ enough to be noticeable. 

 

“Don’t answer my question with another question you daft-“

 

Vanessa doesn’t get to finish her sentence, Charity turns around with a scowl before she can, moving to face her, their noses almost touching with their proximity, and it makes Vanessa smile because knowing exactly how to get Charity’s back up is another thing she’s learned so well now, too.  

 

“Are you  _ always _ this annoying after sex?” Charity says a little haughtily, but Vanessa knows there’s no real malice in her words, not tonight. 

 

“Are you?” Vanessa throws back playfully, just to see how Charity will reply.

 

“Oi, you just-“ Charity says in objection, her eyebrows raised in annoyance before she catches the smug look on Vanessa’s face. “What a bloody wind up - you know, you’re a lot cheekier than I thought you’d be.”

 

“What did you think I’d be like?” Vanessa asks curiously, rolling up onto her side properly to mirror Charity, taking Charity’s hand, resting it on the mattress between them in her own at the last second. 

 

“I don’t think I’d ever taken much notice of you before now, if I’m honest,” Charity says with a contemplative look, actually  _ thinking _ . 

 

“Thanks a lot,” Vanessa replies, rolling onto her back with a huff. So much for this being nice, bollocks, she thinks with a scowl. 

 

She knows it’s reactive, her response, and it’s over-reactive at that, but something about it upsets her, just a bit, maybe because sometimes she’s worried that she isn’t even a blip on the map of Charity Dingle’s life. 

 

Maybe because she’s worried she doesn’t actually mean anything to Charity like Charity does to her. 

 

“No, wait,” Charity says with a sigh, leaning up a little higher to catch Vanessa’s eye, laying her palm on Vanessa’s shoulder. “It’s a good thing, babe.”

 

“How is  _ not _ noticing me a good thing?”

 

“Because it - look, just listen alright,” Charity says with a roll of her eyes, Vanessa catches it before she turns onto her other side away from Charity. 

 

She does it with a purpose, though. 

 

One: because she wants to see if Charity will chase her to the other side of the bed, if she cares enough to set Vanessa straight.  

 

And two: because she knows that Charity is more likely to tell her the truth if Vanessa’s not looking her in the eye, when she doesn’t feel like she  _ has _ to tell it, when she doesn’t feel like Vanessa’s expecting it. 

 

She whispers such soft truths against Vanessa’s back when they’re in bed together, when she thinks Vanessa can’t hear her, or sometimes when she knows she can - so much softer than Vanessa had ever expected. 

 

She tells Vanessa she’s lovely, how much she wants  _ this _ , how much she wants  _ her _ . 

 

How much she  _ craves _ her, too. 

 

There’s a gentle ease in the truth when they’re both so unarmed like this that makes Vanessa marvel at the fact that such a thing can exist when Charity Dingle is involved. Charity has surprised her in a lot of ways she never expected though. And she’s about to again, Vanessa thinks. 

 

“ _ Ness _ .”

 

“I’m listening,” Vanessa says, accepting the arm that snakes over her waist, threading her fingers through Charity’s when her hand comes to rest over her bare breast. 

 

She’s smiling now, because Charity followed her. Not that Charity can see. Not that she’ll tell her, either. 

 

“It’s a good thing if I haven’t noticed you, yeah?” Charity says, brushing her lips against Vanessa’s back as she speaks. “It means I haven’t tried to do you over, or you, me. It means you’ve not been proper horrible like most of the other women have in this bloody village have, without even knowing me. Even with all that rubbish with your dad, I still don’t think you said one thing to me until….”

 

“Until I had a go at you in the bar, that…. that night we got stuck in the cellar,” Vanessa says quietly, remembering. 

 

She’d be lying if she’d thought about Charity much more herself before that night, beyond allowing her eye to linger occasionally in the bar when she knew full well she should have been looking somewhere else entirely. 

 

“People I’ve cared about less have said things far worse than that, Ness,” Charity says quietly, in contrast to what she’d said Vanessa that night. “Look, it means you don’t hate me, babe. Like everyone else does. 

 

“I could never hate you,” Vanessa replies, shaking her head. 

 

“Give it time,” Charity scoffs, and it  _ hurts _ Vanessa, like a punch to the gut, that this is what the world has reduced Charity to: a hopeless cynic. 

 

She rolls back to face Charity then, and she’s glad she did because she’s never seen the look of resigned hurt and pain written so beautifully on anyone’s face before. 

 

“Everybody does, babe,” Charity says sadly, stroking a line along Vanessa’s jaw. “Everybody does, in the end.”

 

“What if I made you a promise?” Vanessa offers, because this is a method she’s discovered works with Charity, promising things - small things - and seeing them through, showing her that she’s not going to let her down like everyone else does. 

 

“What kind of promise,” Charity says, pushing Vanessa onto her back, and Vanessa recognises this well enough, they’re cutting too close to the bone with these words, and Charity’s trying to stray into territory she feels more comfortable in. 

 

Emotion is hard but physicality, Charity knows that better than breathing. 

 

“A promise to -  _ Christ _ , Charity,” Vanessa says with a gasp, when the teeth at her neck bite down hard. 

 

“Do you want me to stop?” Charity offers, looking up from Vanessa’s neck with a smirk, licking her lips. 

 

“No,” Vanessa answers, shaking her head. Because she doesn’t. 

 

“A promise to what, babe?” Charity says with a smugness woven through her words. “Finish your sentence, yeah?”

 

“Not to hate you,” Vanessa manages to stutter when Charity pulls away to catch a breath, wincing when Charity freezes above her. 

 

When she looks back down to Vanessa her expression is different, it’s more serious, and she almost regrets saying anything before she reminds herself that actually, no, she needs Charity to hear this whether she wants to or not. 

 

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, love,” Charity says and for a second Vanessa wonders if she hasn’t messed up the evening royally. 

 

Charity leans down to kiss her, hard and without a touch of gentleness, and Vanessa realises that she has. 

 

She pushes back against Charity gently, shaking her head but wrapping her hands around Charity’s shoulders so she can’t jerk away immediately like Vanessa knows she will, thinking Vanessa is rebuking her, because she’s not, she’s trying to do the opposite. 

 

“Is everything alright?” Vanessa asks her, draping her arms around Charity’s shoulders, running her fingers into Charity’s hair, tempted to pull the tie out of it and allow the blonde curls to fall around Charity’s face. 

 

It takes her aback, Vanessa asking such a simple question, and she watches a myriad of emotions cross Charity’s face, confusion, distrust, uncertainty, before she speaks. 

 

“Uh, yeah,” Charity replies with a frown. “Why, am I-“

 

“No, not this,” Vanessa says, shaking her head. “This is  _ always _ alright, just…. are  _ you _ alright? You seem….I dunno….”

 

“Just  _ alright _ ?” Charity returns, her eyebrow raised, clearly trying to change the subject, and sometimes she’d just let it go, but Vanessa isn’t having a bar of that tonight. 

 

“Charity,” she says, levelling the woman on top of her with an exasperated sigh. 

 

This drives Charity off her, finally, and she falls onto her back with a  _ huff _ , despite Vanessa's best attempts to keep Charity right where she is. 

 

“Since when did we do this, babe?” Charity asks with a sigh, dropping her hand over her eyes, massaging her temples. “The you-me-feelings, thing?”

 

“Well, we don’t,” Vanessa replies, and she doesn’t mean for it to sound moody but it comes out like that, regardless. “But I dunno, I’d like to. I care about you, about whether you’ve had a bad day, or if something’s upset you.” 

 

She moves onto her side, to watch Charity’s chest rise and fall, but she doesn’t move to pull Charity’s hand away from her eyes just yet. 

 

It’s amazing, really, how Charity can find a piece of armour without a stitch on. 

 

“You do?” Charity asks, the sound of her voice a little muffled by her wrists. 

 

She can see Charity soften a little then, and Vanessa knows that if she places her hand over Charity’s she won’t be shrugged off anymore. 

 

“Course I do, you daft thing,” Vanessa admits with a smile, finally peeling Charity’s hand away. “I’m not heartless.”

 

“What, like me?” Charity asks, deferring to a barb rather than facing the truth, but Vanessa isn’t going to let her off that easily, holding her glare and Charity’s hand. “Ugh, alright,  _ fine _ . It’s just new, this whole caring thing, okay? The feelings rubbish, too.”

 

Vanessa doesn’t reply at first, she just holds Charity’s hand until she thinks she sees the snide, witty facade drop completely. 

 

“It’s not hard you know,” Vanessa says softly, and she knows that she’s pushing it now, but she doesn’t care. She’s determined to show Charity that she matters, the cost to her own heart be damned. 

 

“What’s not hard?” Charity replies, and it’s a testament to the fact that Vanessa has gotten her to listen, in the lack of the easy joke that Charity doesn’t bother with. 

 

“Liking you,” Vanessa says simply. “Caring about you. It’s easy.”

 

“You don’t like me, babe,” Charity throws, taking her hand back. “You like what I can make you feel.”

 

“Oi, are you in my head?” Vanessa snaps, leaning up onto an elbow so that she can glare properly at Charity, continuing when she doesn’t get a reply. “No, I didn’t think so. How about you listen to me, then? I care about you, even though you’re a flaming pain in the arse half the time.”

 

Charity doesn’t say anything at first, she looks into the lines of Vanessa’s face for a lie first. She mustn’t see any though, because she doesn’t roll her eyes or scoff. When she replies her voice is melancholic instead. 

 

“Yeah, well, I think you’re about the first person who has, so I think maybe your judgement’s a bit flawed, yeah?” Charity says with a shrug. 

 

“Who’s the one with letters after their name? You or me?” Vanessa glowers before Charity’s mouth cracks at the very edge into a smile. “Right, so you have to listen to me, don't you?” 

 

“I have to do  _ something _ to you, that’s for bloody sure,” Charity returns, and before Vanessa can gather her thoughts, Charity pounces. 

 

She rolls Vanessa back easily, falling between Vanessa’s thighs like the space was made for her alone, taking Vanessa’s hands and pinning them above her head, effortlessly. 

 

She’s surprisingly strong, Charity, and surprisingly quick, too, and Vanessa tries hard not to think of all the reasons why she might have needed to be in the past. Not because it makes her think any less of Charity, not that at all, but because it makes her bones hurt with the tragedy of the fact that she had to learn to be that way at all. 

 

Charity’s teeth close over the juncture of neck and shoulder and she bites down hard enough to make Vanessa squeak. When Charity leans back Vanessa understands that it’s exactly what Charity wanted, too. 

 

“What are you doing?” Vanessa asks, before Charity kisses her, softer than before, but longer. 

 

“Marking my territory,” Charity answers before she descends on Vanessa’s neck again. “Can’t have you being nice to everyone in the bloody world, can we? They’ll think they’ve got a place in this bed and all.”

 

“Yours now, is it?” Vanessa mumbles, straining against Charity’s hold, watching Charity’s eyes flash with something like hunger when she does. 

 

“Isn’t it?” Charity asks in return and Vanessa watches her falter, just slightly, before Vanessa can ease it. 

 

“You know it is, Charity,” Vanessa says, hooking her leg around Charity’s waist, tugging her hips forward, against hers completely. 

 

Vanessa isn’t sure what it is in her expression then; relief, fear,  _ both _ , maybe, but she kisses Vanessa like they’ve got about ten minutes before the world ends, and it’s desperate and messy and delicious, every second of it. 

 

Charity’s hands move from holding her wrists to slipping between her fingers. Their hands twist as she tries to settle into position above Vanessa and Vanessa makes a hopelessly weak show of fighting against something she already knows she wants to lose to. 

 

“Do you want me to say mercy?” Vanessa teases as she bucks beneath Charity. 

 

The movement is so oddly reminiscent of the game she vaguely remembers from her childhood, and she wonders if Charity was granted the luxury of experiencing it before hers was taken away, and the men who paid her didn’t give her the choice to call the word. 

 

“Never,” Charity whispers against her cheek, her breath hot but her voice hotter, and Vanessa swears she can feel a smirk there, too. 

 

It unchains whatever Charity was holding back, Vanessa’s voice, and Charity changes, more determined now. Her hands snake down Vanessa’s arms, leaving nail marks in Vanessa’s wrists were her fingers were, her hands coming to rest on either side of Vanessa’s jaw. 

 

That kiss is softer, Charity’s hands so gentle against her skin that it makes Vanessa’s bones creak, but the one that follows is harder, more aligned to what she has come to associate with Charity, although there’s something else there. 

 

Something possessive. 

 

But it doesn’t worry her, no. She  _ loves _ it. 

 

Charity moves back to Vanessa’s neck, sucking the skin against her teeth so hard that Vanessa can feel it bruise, so hard that she knows no amount of makeup is going to hide it. She knows she should tell Charity to stop, she knows all of these marks will be visible to the world tomorrow, that she doesn’t own a collar high enough or a scarf thick enough, but she doesn’t care. 

 

Because being possessed by Charity Dingle? To be  _ hers _ ? Vanessa can’t think of much else in the world she wants more. 

 

She’s not that person, the one who wants to be controlled by her partners, she’s always preferred to have the power herself in truth, but there’s something about submitting to Charity, to demonstrating her territorial markings like a bloody teenager that makes her melt. 

 

“Mine,” Charity murmurs against her skin before she kisses a rough path down Vanessa’s neck, and Vanessa isn’t sure she even means to utter it but she does -  _ god _ , she does - and Vanessa doesn’t know if she’s ever heard anything sweeter. 

 

She can’t stop her hands from threading into Charity’s hair, from pulling tighter than she means to, to hold Charity to her for as long as she can until Charity runs. 

 

Vanessa hopes that she won’t, but she doesn’t know, she still spends every other second they’re together waiting for Charity to pull her body away, her warmth and charm and scars too, and she spends the other seconds thinking of how she might keep Charity here just a little longer. 

 

Her body is the obvious answer, because she knows Charity wants that, even if she doesn’t want Vanessa’s softness - although, somewhere deep down Vanessa thinks she might want that, too. 

 

She uses that then, she pulls Charity up for a kiss, her tongue sliding into Charity’s mouth and they both groan with the depth of it, with the smouldering heat of it, as it laps at their sides, threatening to consume them both in a blaze of glory. 

 

It leaves them gasping when Vanessa breaks it, breathing hard, and it’s just wild enough to make Vanessa feel completely reckless. This is what Charity does, she thinks, as Charity moves back to her throat, biting harder when Vanessa’s nails carve a thick line down her back, she strips them both to their basest desires without batting an eyelash. 

 

Not that Vanessa’s complaining, because she’s never felt freer than she does with Charity, she’s never felt more unburdened than here in her bed, which is ironic really, because between them they’ve enough burden to sink a bloody ship. 

 

“Mine,” Charity growls again when she starts to move down Vanessa’s body, nipping softly at the skin near her hip, and then harder at the inside of her thigh, and Vanessa knows she meant for that one to be heard. 

 

She feels Charity smile when she yelps, her hands sinking into the flesh of Vanessa’s thighs, curving around the warm skin before Charity urges them further apart to make room for herself. She feels Charity grin again when she tastes how much Vanessa needs her. 

 

“ _ Yours _ , Charity,” Vanessa sighs, when her hands curl around Charity’s head, as Charity consumes, greedily, her tongue keen and quick. 

 

Because she is. And she doesn’t think she ever wants to be anyone else’s. 

 

Charity meets her -  _ takes _ her - with a hunger that Vanessa had questioned the first times they’d shared a bed together, with a hunger that had made Vanessa wonder if this wasn’t all just part of Charity’s charm offensive, but she knows that it’s genuine now. 

 

Because she’s seen the way Charity interacts with others, she’s spent long enough watching by this point to know that she treats Vanessa differently. Even the snide comments and shrugged shoulders were different, and this, them,  _ together _ , is especially different. 

 

Because Charity lets go when they’re like this, because she can, maybe because she’s never been able to in bed before for fear of reprisal or consequence or something, but here, Vanessa thinks Charity finally knows that she’s safe. 

 

Here, she thinks Charity knows she might be loved one day, if she stays long enough to see it. 

 

Here, she thinks Charity knows she can be herself, with as little facade as it’s possible for her to strip off and survive without. 

 

Charity’s hands snake up to palm her breasts roughly as her tongue swirls over her core, driving Vanessa’s back up off the bed before Charity’s hands can push her hips down, where they stay, her arm draped across Vanessa’s stomach to hold her still. 

 

Vanessa’s hands bunch up in the sheets splayed around them as Charity doubles her efforts, biting her lip to hold in the sound threatening to overwhelm her and bring this house down around them. 

 

“Mine,” Charity breathes to her inner thigh one last time after Vanessa comes hard around her fingers and against her mouth, only this time it isn’t a statement, it’s a question, like she’s seeking an affirmation. Like she’s asking Vanessa if it’s true. 

 

“Yours,” Vanessa gasps as she pulls Charity up to her, kisses her roughly, tastes herself on Charity’s tongue. 

 

And it doesn’t matter that Charity will probably pretend like this didn’t happen, that Vanessa didn’t place all her cards face up with the softness of a sigh when the morning comes. 

 

It doesn’t matter, Vanessa thinks as she spills  _ yours, Charity, only yours, _ over and over again, her arms draping around Charity’s shoulders in an attempt to stop her retreat. It doesn’t matter if Charity ever acknowledges this again, because she can taste the relief in Charity’s touch at the confirmation now, she can feel Charity buckle under the weight of it. 

 

It doesn’t matter because she can feel Charity wrap herself around Vanessa’s body, like the snake in a long destroyed garden - fitting really, because she feels like she’s in Eden when she’s with Charity. She can feel Charity accept the touch that Vanessa gives in return, allowing Vanessa to roll onto her back in a way that Vanessa knows  _ means _ something. 

 

In a way that Vanessa hasn’t ever expected Charity to. In a way that says so clearly, like a gunshot in the dawn, something that Charity will never say in words. 

 

She presses a lingering kiss to Charity’s throat, a twin for the mark on Vanessa’s own neck, and she marvels at the way Charity lets her, she marvels at the way Charity  _ invites _ it. 

 

Her teeth are in Charity’s skin when she hears an admission that might very well be a dream, probably is actually, because Charity Dingle doesn’t offer truths like that. 

 

“I’m yours, too, you know,” Charity growls, breathes into the air around them when Vanessa moves down, when her lips trace Charity’s collarbone. And then quieter. " _ God _ , Ness. I'm yours, too."

 

It’s a dream, because it can’t be reality, surely.

 

Because Charity doesn’t feel the same way she does. 

 

She doesn't. She  _ doesn't _ . 

 

_ Does _ she?

  
  


-

**Author's Note:**

> There are a few more little mini-fics on my [tumblr](http://tigerlo.tumblr.com) that aren't on here. If you're interested, swing on by.


End file.
